Hurricane Katrina\r\n\r\n\r\nHurricanes have always been particularly scary to me because I am so unfamiliar with them. I grew up in California and never had to deal with a hurricane my entire life. However, since I moved to New Orleans for school I have encountered many hurricanes and tropical storms. Although I have evacuated several times during my four years at Tulane, Hurricane Katrina was by far the most devastating and frightening.\r\nA week before Katrina hit the Gulf Cost I had just flown in from California. I was extremely excited to see my college friends and boyfriend, so any kind of hurricane was the last thing on my mind. However, within the next three to four days, it seemed to be the only thing my mind could focus on. \r\n The Saturday before Katrina hit, my two best friends and I decided to evacuate to Pensacola, Florida. This was definitely not an easy decision for the three of us to make. One of my friend\'s families lived in Mississippi, while my other friend\'s family lived in Texas. My reason for wanting to go to Florida was partly because my boyfriend lived there. The other reason I wanted to head east towards Florida was to avoid the major traffic of evacuees heading west or north. The thought of having to possibly sit in ten plus hours of traffic was definitely not appealing. I had done it once before, and the experience I had was horrible. Although many may have thought going east was a bad idea, in my mind it was a great idea. \r\n In the end it took all three of us in two separate cars five and a half hours to get to Pensacola. It wasn\'t the smoothest ride because we did hit a few roadblocks and had to take detours, but in the end we arrived safely to our destination in a reasonable amount of time.\r\n We ended up staying at my boyfriend\'s house for about a month and did not return to New Orleans until mid to late September. When I got back to New Orleans I had no idea what kind of shape my apartment would be in. I was relieved to know that my apartment survived the wrath of Katrina. Besides the unpleasant smell of the rotting food in the refrigerator, my apartment was exactly the way I had left it. I knew that I was extremely lucky to not have any water or wind damage. \r\n